Controlling impact power of abrasive water jet machining by piezoelectric actuator's vibration

Abstract

An abrasive water jet machining has little controllability of impact power. For adding controllability to the water jet, we put piezoelectric actuator in flow path. The water jet is modulated by vibrations of this actuator which excited voltage pulses whose frequency is 88KHz. In this study, the modulated jet is impacted to aluminium plate to make holes and the depth of holes are observed by a Laser microscope. As this experiment's result, the depth of holes became shallower as voltage was increased.